592 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



It seems that this is a rare plant, or Mr. 

 Burroughs would certainly have found it in 

 his travels. 



As a forage plant there are better (clover 

 and several other grasses are better) ; but 

 none of them come at a time of year when 

 they can supplant the thyme. This plant 

 will grow and thrive on land too poor for 

 these other grasses to grow on. There is no 

 land too poor, no winter too cold, and no 

 summer too dry, for this plant — at least 

 not in this section, and we have some pretty 

 cold winters and some dry summers. I have 

 known this plant to grow on a side hill of 

 gravel, and in a very dry season cover the 

 ground (stones included) with a luxuriant 

 growth. 



In the thyme belt are a good many large 

 farms, and many of these farmers keep 

 from 25 to 100 cows; and on several of 

 these farms all the cows have to graze on 

 through the summer months is thyme. I 

 have known of but two farmers who tried 

 to get rid of this plant. One deemed it a 

 nuisance, and decided to kill it with salt. 



He began several years ago by buying salt 

 by the carload and spreading it on the land ; 

 but this was only temporary relief. The 

 savory is as much in evidence on this place 

 as ever. Another farmer, purchasing a farm 

 not many years ago, decided he would kill 

 the thyme by plowing, and he started in to 

 plow up his farm, and plowed every field 

 that could be plowed. The plowing of the 

 pasture land only made a better seed bed 

 for the thyme, which grew thicker and more 

 abundantly ; and this place that would bare- 

 ly keep eighteen cows, in a few years was 

 keeping sixty. 



The illustration shows the plant itself. 

 Nearly all the blossoms have fallen ; but by 

 observing closely, a few can be detected. I 

 recently pulled one crown root that con- 

 tained 30 vines or tendrils from 3 to 15 

 inches in length, and each vine had half as 

 many shorter vines attached. None of these 

 vines had taken root, but as a rule the most 

 of them do. 



Prattsville, N. Y. 



A GOOD YIELD FMOM A DOUBLE COLONY 



BY C. R. SMITH 



I am sending you some pictures of a 

 double hive I made a year ago last spring, 

 and also one of the honey crop that I se- 

 cured from it. The hive was an experiment 

 only. The supers were too heavy to handle. 



I started a few nuclei late in the season 

 of 1912, two of which were side by side. 

 They had four and five frames, and not very 

 many bees ; so I put them into a chaff hive 

 with a screen-wire division-board between 

 them. They wintered well, as did all my 

 other bees. Then I thought that, having 

 acquired the same hive 

 odor, they would work 

 together. So I made a 

 hive 32 inches wide the 

 same as two ten-frame 

 hives with two supers, 

 same size. I made a 

 queen-excluding divi- 

 sion-board and lifted 

 the nuclei into the 

 large hive when they 

 had brood started nice- 

 ly. I gave them frames 

 of brood from strong 

 colonies, one at a time, 

 and the hive was filled 

 out full with 20 frames 

 when other colonies be- 

 gan to swarm. 



This double colony did not develop its 

 working force till other hives had filled a 

 super or more. The first super had three 

 shallow frames with drawn comb on outsides 

 (which they filled first), and 52 sections 

 with starters. The bees worked together 

 nicely until the first super was partly done ; 

 then they swarmed when I was away. My 

 wife found both queens, and put them back 

 with the returning bees. In a few days they 

 swarmed again when I was away, but they 

 were still hanging on a limb. I think both 



C. R. Smith's double colony and hive. 



